Suffering from the affliction, alopecia, Stevens was completely bald by middle-age and wore an ill-fitting wig. One day a female admirer came up to him and asked him for a lock of his hair as a keepsake. Steven generously offered her his entire wig. Thaddeus Stevens, Nineteenth Century Egalitarian, by Hans Trefousse, page 7.
In an 1860 speech, Stevens spoke on the issue of sending more troops to Texas. "It is said that the necessity for troops upon the Texas frontier has existed for several years. Since 1853. Why, then, were troops sent to enforce despotism in Kansas? Why were not the troops sent to Texas, which were sent to Mormondom where there was no necessity for them? Why were not the twenty-six hundred or three thousand men sent to Texas who were sent to Utah, and remained there at great cost to the government, for no other reason under heaven, that I can see, except to watch the intercourse between Brigham Young and his concubines [laughter]. And, now that their curiosity is satisfied, they are being removed, as I am informed, as speedily as possible and transferred to the Texan frontier." Speech on April 19, 1860, The Selected Papers of Thaddeus Stevens, Vol. 1, by Beverly Wilson Palmer and Holly Byers Ochoa, page 166.
Later, in the same speech, Stevens said: "We have letters urging upon us, it would seem, that as one or two men and women were killed, we must raise this regiment; as if it were the only way of bringing them back to life. I wish the Indians had newspapers of their own. If they had, you would have horrible pictures of the cold-bloodied murders of inoffensive Indians. You would have more terrible pictures than we have now revealed to us, and, I have no doubt, we would have the real reasons given for those Indian troubles. I suppose they would be as accurate as those you have in the letters which have just been read and which have come in here so opportunely." The Selected Papers of Thaddeus Stevens, Vol. 1, by Beverly Wilson Palmer and Holly Byers Ochoa, page 169.
John Brown -- Hang Him
"John Brown deserves to be hung for being a hopeless fool," Stevens said. "He attempted to capture Virginia with seventeen men when he ought to know that it would require at least twenty-five." Thaddeus Stevens, Nineteenth -Century Egalitarian, by Hans Trefousse, page 97.
When a messenger brought the news of the Confederates burning his Caledonia iron mill to the ground, Stevens joking inquired, "did they burn the debts too." Great Leveler, by Thomas Frederick Woodley, page 357.